Small amplitude ion acoustic solitons in a weakly magnetized plasma with anisotropic ion pressure and kappa distributed electrons

The Zakharov-Kuznetzov (ZK) equation is derived for nonlinear electrostatic waves in a weakly magnetized plasma in the presence of anisotropic ion pressure and superthermal electrons. The anisotropic ion pressure is defined using Chew-Goldberger-Low (CGL) while a generalized Lorentzian (kappa) distribution is assumed for the non-thermal electrons. The standard reductive perturbation method (RPM) is employed to derive the two dimensional ZK equation for the dynamics of obliquely propagating low frequency ion acoustic wave. The influence of spectral index (kappa) of non-thermal electron on the soliton is discussed in the presence of anisotropic ion pressure in plasmas. It is found that ion pressure anisotropy and superthermality of electrons affect both the width and amplitude of the solitary waves. On the other hand the magnetic field is found to alter the dispersive property of the plasma only, and hence the width of the solitons is affected while the amplitude of the solitary waves is independent of external magnetic field. The numerical results are also presented for illustrations. (C) 2014 COSPAR. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.